


Mukui

by PrimeDirectiveSem



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Future, Criminals vs. FBI, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Jack is a jerk, M/M, PTSD Will, Post-Apocalypse, Robots, Technology, as usual, hell yeah
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-06
Updated: 2016-01-13
Packaged: 2018-02-12 01:53:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,614
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2091426
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PrimeDirectiveSem/pseuds/PrimeDirectiveSem
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After an age of warfare wreaks havoc on the United States, Baltimore is reduced to a dystopian prison fortress guarded by iron and steel leviathans created by a crippled Federal Bureau of Intelligence Agency, with the help of a mysterious benefactor across the sea in Japan. </p><p>At the head of the Agency is Jack Crawford, a behavioral specialist who surveys the performance of his invulnerable fleet of monstrous humanoid walkers as they annihilate stray convicts and maintain the border between Baltimore and the rest of the war torn country. </p><p>Piloting the most advanced walker in the fleet is Will Graham, a strategic genius and victim of severe PTSD. Crawford is both intrigued and concerned by Graham’s effortless ability to empathize with the machine he animates and with the criminals he incarcerates, as is Dr. Hannibal Lecter, a renowned psychiatrist and, unbeknownst to the entire city, a cunning and vengeful cannibalistic serial killer whose motives inside the limits of the city remain a tantalizing secret.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Preface

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first work ever...and I haven't really even started yet. More tags to come. Sorry for the choppy updates, the preface is complete now. :) The preface will explain the history behind the setting of the AU, so it won't go on with this narrative forever.

If there is any explanation as to how the war officially began, it has been condemned to the underground of urban legends and miscellaneous lore. Even now, there is nothing to read about a justice system that no one can fully understand anymore, and although many scholars have elaborated on the mechanics of civil war and politics, little can be said for the majority of what occurred. 

Maybe it was a change, an amendment that forced a party to their breaking point. Perhaps it was an election that angered a different party, or a group of rogue mavericks searching the country for reform. That is what the people wanted, wasn’t it? Change and reform. It is and always will be human nature to desire something that we haven’t yet obtained, and history often depicts that more clearly than the present does. So it comes as no surprise that when the spark of an idea of something new was brought about, people, in every place, shape, and form, jumped forward with their torches, eager to encourage the newborn flame. 

Domestic violence and quarrels over state law became more typical. Prison breaks became routine and escaped convicts reigned supreme over their hometowns before swarming to larger cities. Authorities intervened, but only to be met with forces double their own, fighting against the results of horded firearms and artillery. 

Eventually, there were three essential classes of individuals in the United States: criminal, law enforcement, and civilian. Through the violence and destruction, many were left with nothing, their money and valuables barely salvageable. Lower, middle, and upper class labels didn’t matter anymore. Financial differentiation was gone and interdependent practices were being brought into the beginnings of law enforcement and civilian communities. 

Criminal communities were small and independent, but more frequent than law enforcement and civilian circles. Convicts lived like kings, always gluttonous for the spoils they could usually snag from the authorities. By now, their numbers had grown, as had their equipment and weaponry. Select civilians sought more luxurious lives within criminal factions, swapping out information regarding the disintegrating federal government for a decent roof to cover their heads. Espionage entailed and civilians became nothing more than disregarded refugees in the calculating eyes of the authorities. No one could be trusted. A new, even more exclusive war was waged between the rebelling criminals and authoritative powers.

And that was when the tables finally turned. 

A distress signal sent from a naval forces vessel in the Pacific reached Japan. Communicating through an entirely new genus of code, the Americans inquired about a miracle weapon of mass destruction, the likes of something the world had never seen. They begged for technology they could no longer hope to achieve on their own with their resources squandered. “Be our benefactor,” the Americans said. “Fund us, and in return, we can offer you a percentage of the stolen currency we will reclaim.” The Japanese complied, the challenge of a new weapon to fabricate heavy on their minds. 

And so from the fires of factories and forges across the island rose a humanoid machine of monstrous proportions, known today as an Auto Animated Hybrid. Walking on two hulking limbs of steel, the Hybrid could stand upright with ease. It could advance on an opponent with a push of a lever. It could locate multitudes of targets with the press of a button. The pilot need only slip inside the hatch between the Hybrid’s shoulders and press their palm to a handprint recognition panel to manipulate the machine. Equipped with automatic artillery of every kind and software designed to fit the requirements of professional combatants, the Hybrid was the nation’s ultimate Saving Grace. 

Soon after the integration of the Hybrid in American law enforcement, order was somewhat restored, but legions of criminal colonies still existed. The Americans were in debt, the Japanese releasing new Hybrid updates every month it seemed. They had done more than keep their promise to aid the crippled nation. 

A massive amount of power was invested in the FBI. Federal sovereignty was losing form to new communities that found life easier in socialist and communist factions. The FBI was accessible, with field offices and even more resident agencies for civilians to find sanctuary within. 

With the FBI in the position to strike, investigations became raids. Raids became law. And with the Auto Animated Hybrids at the heels of a new elite force, the law was untouchable.


	2. Relapse

Baltimore was on fire. 

At least that’s what it looked like to Will Graham’s eyes as he surveyed the panorama of the city from inside his Hybrid. Fluttering lights of yellow and orange painted the darkness surrounding the narrow roads and towering edifices. 

Even at an evening hour, the streets bustled with inhabitants of the city. The black of night cradled a full moon, shedding light on the metallic bodies of the Hybrids that followed Graham’s lead. There were at least ten, maybe more. The dense mass of pedestrians split to accommodate the bulk of the Hybrid machines, their heavy lower limbs clunking on concrete.

Will’s Hybrid was a Pursuer, the most advanced Hybrid of its kind. Used almost exclusively by profilers and members of SWAT and investigation teams, the Pursuer was heavily armed with semiautomatic and assault rifles secured to the flanks of its upper limbs. Will wasn’t used to piloting a Pursuer and he hadn’t planned on being at the helm of one at any point. Ever. But there he was, at an investigation, just like Jack Crawford said he would be. 

At that moment, he despised, resented Jack for convincing him to take the new model in the first place. 

Will responded with irritation when Jack promoted him. For as long as he had been working at the academy in Quantico, Will had piloted an Auto Animated Hybrid Observer, which was only used for analyzing evidence found at crime scenes and for transportation services. Its technology scanned items to create 3D models and matched fingerprints to faces in a matter of seconds, transferring data from its hardware to the server at the academy. Beverly Katz, Jimmy Price, and Brian Zeller all had Observers for work in the Behavioral Science Unit. The Observers had brains. That was for sure, but they lacked the brawn of the Pursuer. 

When he wasn’t on expeditions in the field, Will was perfectly content at the academy, giving lectures on the science of biometry and training cadets from the safety of a simulator. But Jack always managed to get him on a case or two each month. It was pathetic how Will gave in to his appeals each and every time he asked for Will’s insight. Jack had ever so subtly hinted at granting Will the position in the Pursuer just last week when they had met in Crawford’s office.

“The new Pursuer can be equipped with a grenade launcher, Will,” Jack had told him. “You could take out around ten birds with one big stone.” He laced his fingers together on top of his desk and smiled coyly. Will sat across from him, head cocked to the side in mock contemplation. 

“I know. I saw the concept from the facility in Tokyo.” Will had muttered halfheartedly. He hadn’t actually seen the concept; he didn’t care. He had come to Jack’s office for a friendly cup of coffee and the potential promise of an awkward silence. He hadn’t hauled himself there to be bribed into piloting Baltimore’s newest weapon of justice. He didn’t want that. He didn’t want the ego, the responsibility, and he certainly didn’t want the attention of what Jack was asking of him. Will knew exactly what Jack Crawford was asking of him. 

Will’s empathy was unique, he could understand machines like no one else, and the team valued his strategic intuition. But Will wasn’t making an exclusive offer to the FBI, and Jack didn’t understand that. And maybe Will was just offended by the fact that Jack wouldn’t even back off after his biggest PTSD phase, after his depression, his breakdowns, his nightmares. Jack knew what Will was capable of. That was why he was so persistent. And persistence is always rewarded with results. 

So really, Will shouldn’t have been surprised when he arrived at work the next day, expecting to be greeted by Bev, Jimmy, and Brian and was instead escorted to the bowels of the academy where the accursed Hybrid Pursuer stood under the flickering light of the basement level. The walker was still partially submerged in a tank of what Will presumed was a coolant substance of some sort. Jack had clapped him on the back and, with a tightlipped smile, informed Will that the Auto Animated Hybrid Pursuer Model 2349 was now his. Legally. 

“I really don’t have the stamina or the experience to pilot this thing, Jack,” he had said, but he already knew he had lost. 

“That’s nonsense, Will. You’re the best pilot the Behavioral Analysis Unit has.” Jack retreated back to the upper level after that. 

Will had drawn blood biting his lip, trying to keep from exploding into a vengeful god of any and all offensive language. But he wasn’t that professional and he rarely expressed himself emotionally, so he went outside as soon as he could and promptly threw up into a garbage receptacle. He swore loudly. And then he felt a stinging in his eyes he hadn’t really expected to feel. He hadn’t cried in months. 

Will hated crying. It gave him headaches and although those were easily and instantly cured with a single pill, the idea that being promoted made him sick and depressed was more of an admonition to the severity of his disorder than anything else. 

Even then, tromping through the city, surrounded by pilots that had been protecting Baltimore for years, just as he had, Will’s mind was nothing but flashbacks. He knew that this wasn’t the front line. He wasn’t at the edge of the city; he was in the middle of it. He knew that there was a SWAT team there and that they were piloting older versions of FBI approved Pursuers. He knew that everyone was armed and that they would win a fight if it came to that. 

But he still heard screaming. The ringing was unfathomable and he heard it every time he jumped down the hatch of an armed Hybrid. He could feel the Pursuer’s steel structure trembling under his boot-clad feet, poised to fire. His Observer was different. He couldn’t kill with it. Unarmed Hybrids didn’t classify as a threat either. So he wasn’t even a target inside the Hybrid Observer. Which was a nice thought. 

But Jack didn’t give a damn about what Will thought. 

Will’s Pursuer towered above the civilians. Hybrids usually measured up to be about twenty feet tall, give or take. Peering from behind the visor, Will saw a child smile and wave up at him from the arms of its mother as she hurriedly rushed through the busy night time streets. Will couldn’t bring himself to wave back. What could he gesture with? The hulking metal fist that rested at the Hybrid’s side? He thought that a little intimidating. 

Community homes sprawled over the expanse of the city. People lived together nowadays mostly because they trusted each other. Family values were important and the city built communities and resources around relationships with others. Individuals made their own lives in Baltimore, which couldn’t really be said for other cities that had been demolished during the war. 

The home the Pursuers were investigating was in the midst of the city. That was strange, especially considering homicide, and crime in general, usually took place on the outskirts of Baltimore, where criminal refugees could find loopholes in the FBI’s guard, not at the heart of it. 

The murder of Thomas and Theresa Marlow was atypical. Jack Crawford and his profilers, save for Graham, couldn’t make sense of two murders at the same time in the center of the city. Resident killers were exceedingly rare, with the constant exception of the Chesapeake Ripper, whose modus operandi occasionally ravaged the streets of Baltimore. One would think that after the copious amount of time the Ripper had spent terrorizing residents, the Hybrids would have caught him. But they hadn’t. Yet.

As the Hybrids approached the destination, Will breathed deeply and counted to ten, inhaling and exhaling, trying to calm himself. But the anticipation of recreating the crime scene was gnawing at his conscious and the Pursuer’s lumbering massiveness was already making him uneasy. 

The community home was large, refurbished and suitable for at least five different family units. The Marlow’s quarters were arranged at the front of the house, so Will had no trouble ripping the door from its hinges, the Hybrid’s enormous metal fingers digging into the wood of it. The other pilots tentatively stepped inside the house, their Hybrids scanning the room, storing away the images for later analysis. 

Community homes were built before the arrival of Auto Animated machines, so the ceilings seldom allowed enough room for fully operational Hybrids. Some demolition was required for thorough investigations. The home had already been evacuated, so there was no risk to any civilians. 

Will tossed the remains of the door behind him, advancing over the threshold. A blood splattered touchscreen panel beeped and scanned the Pursuer, a red light moving up and down over the machine. It signaled in recognition of an FBI asset. 

No investigators had seen the crime scene prior to Will and the other Hybrids’ arrival, so the evidence hadn’t been tampered with. Jack had received a call from another family in the community home just minutes ago and sent the fleet out promptly. The door may have displayed some evidence of forced entry, but now that it was in pieces on the ground behind Will, it wouldn’t have a whole lot to show, even with the tech at the academy. 

Will didn’t dare try to knock out the ceiling, lest the debris would land on the bodies of Thomas and Theresa Marlow, whose blood was already spattered around the room. He crouched as low as he could, the Hybrid’s metal body screeching.

Arterial spray covered the wall close to Mrs. Marlow’s body. Will stepped closer and regarded the corpse. His pulse hammered in his throat. His memories melded into the present, and for a millisecond he couldn’t tell whether or not the body was burning, the fiery recollections of the war at the very edge of his mind. 

He closed his eyes and the pendulum swung. 

* * *

The gore shrinks away, the flecks of Mrs. Marlow’s blood crawling away from the walls and into empty space. The other investigators that have since entered the vicinity are swept away by the pendulum, but Will stays put. He looks around the room, but there’s nothing. The bodies are gone, the pendulum retracing the steps of the killer. 

Then Will is stepping out of the house. The front door closes. Streets that should be busy are now unoccupied, and no Hybrids or even emergency vehicles are waiting for him, just the barren concrete beneath the Will’s own feet. The Hybrid doesn’t manifest when he’s empathizing, and he relishes in the fresh air outside of the cockpit. 

Once he’s a fair distance away from the house, he closes his eyes, breathing deeply. His empathy is functioning at full throttle, and Will can feel the excitement brimming beneath the last shreds of his own conscious. 

He runs towards the house, kicking the door in and drawing the handgun used to kill Mr. and Mrs. Marlow. 

Mr. Marlow is already running down the stairs as he hears the door being forced open. Will is ready, and he fires. 

“I shoot Mr. Marlow twice, severing jugulars and carotids with near surgical precision. He will die watching me take what is his away from him…this is my design.” 

In Will’s peripheral vision, the touchscreen panel is blaring and Mrs. Marlow’s fingers work rapidly at its surface. He fires again, this time at Mrs. Marlow. 

“I shoot Mrs. Marlow expertly through the neck. This is not a fatal wound. The bullet misses every artery. She’s paralyzed before it leaves her body. Which doesn’t mean she can’t feel pain…it just means she can’t do anything about it. This is my design.”

Will turns to the panel. They are fabricated by the FBI for residencies throughout Baltimore, and they are specifically made to prevent situations like this. But there are ways to fool them, and Will knows that. 

The panels read Locators, and Locators are placed inside every resident of Baltimore. They are surgically placed, and they have to be surgically removed. Precision is optional. 

It doesn’t take much more than a small incision to the forearm to take the Locators from Mr. and Mrs. Marlow, but the Locators will stop blinking green as soon as both of them are actually dead, or seconds after they are taken out of their bodies, which is why Will hurries. His fingers are steady as he wields a simple pocketknife and rips the flashing microchip devices from his victims. 

The panel blinks, and demands identification. Mrs. Marlow had managed to alert the system, but Will is quick to press the blood soaked Locators against its surface. That’s all it takes for the panel to cease its screaming and disarm itself. The Locators begin to flash red, but now that Thomas and Theresa Marlow are entered into the FBI’s citywide system via resident panel as alive and well, it doesn’t matter. 

Will slips the Locators into his coat pocket and leaves the way he came.

* * *

Once out of the home, Will was back inside the Hybrid. 

The vehicles and machines that he had expected to see before were now gathered around the community home, sirens wailing. The light blurred his vision and he was already nauseous. An ear splitting headache gorged itself on his nerves and he felt bile rise up in his throat. Dizziness consumed him and for the second time that night, flashbacks gnawed holes into his brain. He was on fire, but cold sweat dripped from his forehead. 

He was relapsing. And there was nothing he could do about it, especially not from inside the Pursuer.

It was never going to end, was it?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, so obviously some things are different. Jack and Will have met before and they know each other fairly well. The FBI is a more tight knit group of people at this point so that should be taken into account. Also, this is alternate universe, but my writing is not always that well thought out, so I apologize if some parallels are lacking consistency. Other than that, I really hope you like it and suggestions and tips are MORE than welcome. :)


	3. Stories

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well. It's been literally over a year, and that proves I'm bad at commitment by a long shot. But here's chapter 3.

When Will finally did wake up, he was still dreaming. Feverish and hysterical flashes of light screamed for attention in his peripheral vision as he opened his eyes, still bleary eyed and blinking away sleep. He felt heavy, as if double his weight was thrown on top of him and was dragging him down into the worn blankets strewn about the bed. 

Finding that he was lying in a bed that wasn’t his own, he tried to sit up, but couldn’t, the invisible weight of exhaustion too heavy for motion. He didn’t close his eyes again, knowing that he would see his own thoughts instead of the off-white walls of a hospital room. Which was just as horrific. 

The shock of waking up in a clinical environment was almost as severe as the malignant fear he had felt welling up inside him as he lost consciousness in the Pursuer. He was back where he started after serving in the war. Broken, depressed, invalid, and, despite what he tried to tell himself, completely hopeless. 

There was nothing he could do about his condition anymore; the medication he had been taking for months obviously hadn’t fixed his problem, and he cringed to think of what Jack would have to say to him when he was released from the hospital. If he was released from the hospital, he thought wearily. Who knew how long it would take for him to recover? Will couldn’t even remember the majority of the events following the investigation; it was all just a blur of nausea, the unfathomable noise of screeching of metal, and a furious burst of color here and there. 

Memory and perception were ravenous wolves tearing his resolve to bloodied shreds. Trauma was inescapable, even for all of Will’s prescription drugs and half assed therapy sessions with people who claimed they knew what they were talking about. 

Therapy wasn’t his idea. Will didn’t like people talking in general, so it was unimaginable for him to sit in a chair and be interrogated about the way he felt. What was there to feel? Everything he knew was violent and wrong he shoved away, deeper into the crevices of his mind, and everything that he knew was good he discarded as a distraction from his work and cruel trick from his imagination. There was a balance that kept him relatively sane, but it hurt. It hurt to force every piece of information and every emotion away so that he couldn’t feel it. 

Swallowing thickly, Will tried to curl his fingers into a fist. Calluses scratched against rough blankets as he did. He smiled dryly at the small victory of being able to move that much. He would make it his goal, he thought, to turn his head to the right and stare at the door blankly for however long it took for Jack to come and tell him something stupid. 

After what he thought was a half hour, Will received a visit from a very optimistic nurse, Will turned his head to the right. 

“Are you comfortable?” she asked with a bright smile and an encouraging nod. Will was not mutually enthusiastic. 

“Yes, thank you,” Will whispered almost inaudibly. She left with her clipboard tucked under an arm and a grin plastered to her face. Will refrained from vomiting. 

After another half an hour or so, Jack and someone Will assumed was a physician of some sort came through the door. 

For a moment, Jack just stared at Will from the doorway, probably assessing the level of pain he was in, and then assessing how much more he could handle. 

“Hi, Jack,” Will muttered. He smiled sarcastically just to spite himself. 

Jack glanced at his watch. “Good afternoon, Will.” He took a seat in an uncomfortable-looking chair next to Will, and then gestured to the opposite side of the bed where the assumed physician could sit. 

Will couldn’t watch the other man or his reactions when he moved out of his line of vision; Will was still facing the door. Something about that made Will nervous. He hadn’t realized visitors were permitted, and Will was almost compelled to press the magic button on the wall and get Jack and his new friend away from him. 

“How do you feel?” Jack leaned forward in his seat, his hands clasped together between his knees. “More like yourself?”

Hell, no, Will thought. He would have snarled, but instead gave the best nod he could manage. “Tired,” he managed to croak. That, at least, was not a blatant lie. 

“I’ll bet,” Jack replied with a wry smile. With a deep intake of breath, he said, “Will, I’d like you to meet Doctor Hannibal Lecter. He’ll be consulting with the you and the rest of the unit on a case…which I haven’t actually shown you as of yet.” 

Something about the way Jack said the word “consulting” seemed rehearsed. He emphasized, made too much eye contact. He was an obvious liar. But maybe it was just obvious to Will, he couldn’t tell anymore. As Jack spoke, Dr. Lecter stepped into Will’s view, standing behind Jack’s chair. 

He was tall, though not monstrously so. He wore a suit, impeccably dressed. He had a unique face; eyes that glinted black first, and then brown and red the more Will looked at him through his own bleary eyes. Lecter had a broad mouth, made for insincere smiles for bad puns and for humoring anyone who smiled at him. Dr. Lecter seemed to carry himself with aplomb, if not outright arrogance. Pretentious, Will immediately thought. And then, reconsidering, sensibly sophisticated?

Lecter’s mouth moved. “Hello, Will. I will shake your hand and introduce myself properly another time, when you are feeling better…and can move.” The mouth curved upward again. An insincere smile. 

Motherfucker, Will thought. Definitely pretentious. Otherwise deriding comments aptly disguised as friendly jabs. Will didn’t even know this man, but he wasn’t in the mood for jokes, friendly or otherwise. 

“Consulting on the case,” Will croaked. “Is that the only thing you’re consulting on?” He eyed Jack and Lecter warily. He knew Jack was on the lookout for signs of his psychological instability. Will couldn’t blame him. His seizures and flashbacks were getting worse, though he hadn’t let on before the Marlowes. Will hadn’t thought the case would escalate the downward spiral of his imagination as quickly as it did. 

Dr. Lecter gazed expectantly at Jack, who in turn looked away from Will. 

“You shouldn’t lie, Jack,” Will muttered steadily. 

“Well, you’re in luck, because I’m not. Lying, that is,” Jack inhaled heavily and tucked his hands into his coat pockets. “I won’t lie to you, Will.”

Jack tries so damn hard, Will thought with exhaustion. He nodded wearily in Jack’s generally direction. 

“This new case though, Will. I’ve got Price and Zeller and Katz and everyone else busting their asses trying to catch this guy, but we keep hitting rock bottom.” Jack made a cutting motion with his hand. Dr. Lecter’s eyes smoldered maroon. “We don’t know yet, but the killer could be a convict from outside the city, maybe coming from the west. There’ve been a couple of those reported…elsewhere.” Jack waved dismissively. 

Sometimes, if the entire police and FBI force of Baltimore was feeling bold, they might send Hybrids out into the State to collect and incarcerate convicts and rehabilitate the refugees. That was Wartime talk, though. They didn’t do it often, at least not anymore. Stragglers from outside the walls were usually the cause of trouble and mayhem in the city. They could climb the walls. They could blend in, become citizens, and then rip something or someone apart so fast the authorities were reeling for any indication of who they were, how they got in, and how the force might prevent it from happening again. 

Will had learned it like this: Identified Stragglers on the inside were walking targets. Stragglers on the outside were optional targets. Stragglers either were already criminals or would grow up to be, it didn’t matter. If the wall wasn’t strong enough, reinforce it tenfold at the cost of valuable resources. If it wasn’t tall enough, build it higher at the cost of never seeing blue sky ever again. The city was domed. It guarded against air raids. It was vitally necessary. All of it was vitally necessary, they told him. 

Stragglers would show up on the outskirts all the time. If self-proclaimed regional militias didn’t snag them first, the FBI was never far behind. If the Stragglers didn’t have weapons, they could be tried in court. But the assumption was always that if you were on the outside, it was because the force had forced you out during the war.

Will wondered about the truth of those assumptions. After all, there were children out there too, who had the potential for citizenship and a right to education. Right? 

Naturally, Will hated exterior Straggler cases. The interior cases, where the Stragglers had already established a life and an identity inside the city, were generally easy. The exterior Stragglers were coming from all over North America, trying to infiltrate still standing cities. The culture was different. The killers were different. Will had to adjust, and if he adjusted too much, well. That was a story he just didn’t want to tell.


End file.
